YouTube begins fighting ad blockers by slowing down load times

[whawn]

Regarding Techspot's reliance on ads: I disabled Ad-blocker Plus for Techspot quite some time ago. I have seen in that time not one objectionable ad. Ads are always unobtrusive and outside editorial copy. Most are not even recognizable as ads, but often seem to be extensions and embellishments to editorial matter. YouTube could do the same, were it inclined, but instead, it accepts whatever anyone lays down cash to buy space for.

 

[kukoljaleksandar]

Yeah, no such thing. Something is either getting rebutted or not. And none of what I wrote is only from my personal perspective. I actually went out my way to explain things from multiple perspectives, including both the website owners' and also that of the users'.

No, you just shown how butthurt you are.

Yeah, no. I've just explained in my previous post why that's also a completely false information.

You obviously can't tell facts from fiction.

Explained? You are delusional if you consider your rant explanation of anything.

No, it's not. There's no middle ground between truth and falseness. There's no middle ground between doing the right thing and doing the wrong thing.

Sorry, prophet, I did not notice that you hold universal right to define what is truth and what is not.

You are exactly the type of person that proves why Ad-blockers must exist.

Ad blockers are not necessary. I don't use them, and hundreds of millions of other people don't use them. Yet, we still browser the web, and don't die of ad overdose, and our computers don't get infected. You know why? Because ad blockers are not necessary. Theft is not necessary.

They are not necessity, but convenience. On some websites. On another, they are absolutely necessary.

Like I said, you pretend that years of ad-ridden internet experience did not happen.

Situation is now much better, because ad blockers exist. Once they are gone, we will watch plenty of pop ups and ads all over main pages once more in less than 6 months.

Exactly. Nothing happens to you when you turn off the ad blocker. But people who put honest work into providing content and services to you will be able to recoup their costs and put food on the table.

I get that. So, I actually disable adblocker for 99% of websites that I visit regularly. Why? Because they deserve it.

Which of course is nothing more than a very stupid statement. The business model is fine. The problem lies with the thieves.

That's not a problem. The problem is when people keep consuming content/services BUT refuse to "pay" for it, even if all they'd have to do is just allow the ads to show. That's just simply theft.

Any other delusion want to share with us?

They already did. And you don't want to pay for that either.

You definitely seem to be.

How the hell you know what I pay for and what I not pay for? I actually have quite a few subscriptions for websites I like and respect.

But you seem to have some prophetic skills to know what I don't pay and I am thief because using ad-blocker?
It is either pure impudence or pure idiocy from your side, because there is nothing else that can cause person to make such statements without knowing his interlocutor.

The "understanding" is that the website renders its services and content in return for showing ads, because it's the ads that pay, so, you don't have to. That's why they show ads. If they'd not need the ads to pay instead of you, they'd charge you directly. What part of this simple concept are you unable to understand?

I understand it, I already explained to you, but you are so angry that you do not understand it.

They can ask for money, and if they are good enough, people will pay. Or they can live from ads, but that is not a remarkably successful business model for one website.

Like when you only pay for movies in the cinema when you liked the movie? Like when you only pay for your steak in the supermarket if you liked it? How about your boss only pays you when he thinks you deserve it, regardless of you having worked X hours?

My boss pays me based on my results, not my hours. Boss does not give a **** about your hours.

As for movie or steak, it is a bit apple to orange comparison. Yet, you can be fool and pay for **** movie or bad steak only once... With websites, it is a bit different story.

The services has been already rendered to you, and you've consumed the resources already. And we're talking about ads. Pixels on a screen. It costs you nothing. Yet you refuse even that. It's theft.

I have nothing agains pixels on the screen. My ad blocker is disabled for many websites I visit (Techspot included).

I have against shitty ads being major content, like it is on some websites, like it is becoming trend on youtube.

For you to be considered any kind of consumer, you'd have to pay, or at least allow the ads to show. A person who does neither is not a consumer, in the eyes of the website, but a thief.

Like I said, I pay for websites I find worthy, or at least allow ads to be shown. But that needs to be earned.

And that is key advantage of internet compared to other media, one key advantage that make it main channel for information and pushed TV and newspapers to obsolescence. Now you want to turn history backwards... It does not work that way mate, sorry.

Regarding Techspot's reliance on ads: I disabled Ad-blocker Plus for Techspot quite some time ago. I have seen in that time not one objectionable ad. Ads are always unobtrusive and outside editorial copy. Most are not even recognizable as ads, but often seem to be extensions and embellishments to editorial matter. YouTube could do the same, were it inclined, but instead, it accepts whatever anyone lays down cash to buy space for.

Exactly! If all websites had such kind of ads, 95% of people would not use Ad blocker. So, it is not matter of survival, but matter of greed.

 

[bennyg]

Adblocking is not theft. Theft is a property crime. Adblocking is not a crime (and unlike copyright infringement, isn't even a civil wrong) and property crimes generally are antiquated w.r.t. anything that can be duplicated for ~zero cost, such as IP, digital data and the internet. It's just as silly to use this term "theft" as it is piracy.

If your business runs on ad revenue it's relying on a risky, volatile revenue source. We've seen how hard legacy media relied on ad revenue, and how hard losing print ads to online has cost them all. You can either passively accept this risk and have it decimate your profitability, or you can do something about it and lessen your exposure ahead of time. This lesson of the last 3 decades is free for everyone to see. The ad reliant business today has chosen to leave themselves exposed to ad block related loss of revenue.

Like all the big tech corps, YouTube has relied for years on the predatory pricing, loss leading, user-growth-before-profitability strategy since day 1 to dominate their market sector. Yt making their product worse on purpose on competing browser products screams monopolistic abuse of market power, and I fully expect google to be donating a large sum to the EU antitrust commission in a few years time over this.

Ads fundamentally deteriorate the user experience wherever they are, and have no redeeming feature to that individual experience. At best, the effect is negligible - but these are ads that are objectively bad at being ads, without attention an ad is worthless.

You can't blame the individual user for making a decision to do that which is legal, free, and improves their experience. I think you can blame the business that suffers degraded revenue, as they have made a decision 'with knowledge aforethought' to rely in part or in full on ad revenue, or alternatively, the business that has negligently failed to address the risk to that revenue source, should generate no tears in anyone. Corporate Darwinism is the beating heart of capitalism.

 

[Hotlynx16]

A year ago I helped a disabled friend that is on low fixed income by upgrading his bottom of barrel Dell PC with a SSD and 8GB of ddr4 (max). Put an ad blocker on because all the ads were slowing his browsing down! He called me and said he had to turn his ad blocker off just to watch church programs on YOUTURD! So Sad!

 

[ZedRM]

The sooner YouTube stops trying to fight the adblockers and simply engineers a way to attach ads to the front and back of the video's, things like this will stop being a problem.

BTW @ Techspot Staff & Admins,
Concerning this: https://www.techspot.com/whitelist/

It's interesting that you posted that statement without giving us users an option to render input, so I'll make a suggestion here.

Instead of asking users to "whitelist", be proactive and structure your ads system to be unintrusive and unblockable. In other words, tunnel ads through your domain(techspot.com/futurecdn.com) so that blocking them will effectively block the whole site. Using such a method allows you so show ads while at the same time not intruding on user privacy and security.

It is YOUR responsibility to earn revenue in a manner that respects us users. It is not our responsibility to expose ourselves to the frequently risky and often dangerous ad network garbage. Vet and filter your ads manually. Focus your ads on the users that visit here and strictly control what is and is not shown. Yes, it takes more effort, but that IS your responsibility. Us users have absolutely no obligations to open ourselves to potential data thieves, scammers and corporate entities that have zero business possessing our data(personal or otherwise) and tracking our actions & movements.

The onus is on YOU, not us. Remember that.